I don't think it should be a surprise that as Youtube hired more and more experienced hands from cable and broadcast TV that it would progressively become more and more like TV.
People complain about the manipulative algorithms. But they don't exist in a vacuum, they are the results of some execs deciding to manipulate people. And the way those decisions are made is the same way traditional TV made during all those years.
Then you hire the same execs, to please the same wall street analysts, but now you can use technology to enable the most perverted wet dreams of those TV executives, and you get what you get nowadays on youtube.
It is not different from what the greater web has become once we hired all the advertising people to control and direct our web experiences.
Hmm. Has YouTube been in the news for hiring broadcast execs?
As somebody who is connected to broadcast, that doesn’t seem right to me - broadcast TV tends to be very control-freak-ish and the higher ups LOVE data, and I really doubt a broadcast exec would willingly chuck out an audience measurement datapoint. The broadcast ad model is that you create shows that have big audiences so you get lots of ad impressions. The decision to remove the dislike button seems more about removing community negativity and/or simplifying moderation, which isn’t really something that I’d expect a TV exec to put a big push on.
People complain about the manipulative algorithms. But they don't exist in a vacuum, they are the results of some execs deciding to manipulate people. And the way those decisions are made is the same way traditional TV made during all those years.
Then you hire the same execs, to please the same wall street analysts, but now you can use technology to enable the most perverted wet dreams of those TV executives, and you get what you get nowadays on youtube.
It is not different from what the greater web has become once we hired all the advertising people to control and direct our web experiences.